Acceptance, in spirituality, mindfulness, and human psychology, usually refers to the experience of a situation without an intention to change that situation.
Acceptance does not require that change is possible or even conceivable, nor does it require that the situation be desired or approved by those accepting it.
Indeed, acceptance is often suggested when a situation is both disliked and unchangeable, or when change may be possible only at great cost or risk.
Thus someone may decide to take no action against a situation and yet be said to have not accepted it.
Now, I guess that’s where the serenity prayer comes into hand
God grant me the serenity to ACCEPT the things I cannot change, COURAGE to change the things I can, and the WISDOM to know the difference
When I was in my last program before I hit the streets, I fought acceptance HARD. I tried to analize the serenity prayer by saying, how do I KNOW what things I cannot change, if I don’t TRY?
Ah, but if I had looked at the last part of the prayer, I might have seen “and the wisdom to know the difference” lol
I guess for ME, that wisdom was slow in learning, but the longer I was in recovery, and did the things that were suggested, the wisdom started coming
I started to make better decisions on WHAT I could change and WHAT I could not
The wisdom taught me just how far I could go and what I could do to try and change some of those things
Now, that doesn’t mean I have to accept EVERYTHING. There are some things in life that I will NEVER accept
The only difference today is, I’ve learned to deal with those things, and handle or react to them differently
Acceptance of failure might be something that I can’t accept, unless I’ve exhausted every thing I know of to change that
Doesn’t mean I would like it, but it might be something that I would have to learn to accept
The one thing that I know I’ve accepted (and don’t really like), is that I’ll NEVER be able to drink again, if I wish to continue this life
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